Chapter 275 - What a Con (2/2)

Lonemoon heaved a sigh of relief. It was good to know that everything was going to be alright.

“There’s one more person whose situation is quite complicated…” Meng Po frowned, as if trying to solve a difficult puzzle. “His soul is almost completely dissipated, yet he still refuses to enter Samsara.”

Lonemoon realised who she was talking about immediately. “Hongyu?”

She nodded and waved her hand. An elderly man with white hair and a white beard appeared in front of the two of them. He still had a kind and gentle expression on his face, but now he looked much more worried and pained. The God Power that once surrounded his body was now almost transparent. He looked almost as if he would disappear at any moment.

“You…” On seeing Lonemoon, Hongyu paused. He seemed to realise something as he bent down and sat on the floor. The fight had completely left his body. His expression was one of utter hopelessness. “I planned this for so many years. I did not expect that everything would come to this.”

Lonemoon frowned, not knowing what to say in response. Hongyu was not a bad person by nature. He harboured no selfish intentions. All he wanted was to keep everything in the world the way they were. He did not even mind jumping into the Reincarnation Stage and blowing himself up. Bai Ze said that when Hongyu organised sermons, he would never turn down any visitor, nor would he keep anything for himself. More than 80 percent of the beings in the Divine Realm had received some sort of grace from him as well.

Even though he did all of this just to claim a little bit of each person’s remnant soul to aid him in destroying the Underworld, they could not deny that he was good at heart. What’s more, he knew the technique to control people’s souls. He could have done what Bian Xinchen did – steal people’s primary souls to boost his own God Power – yet he did not. To the end, he did not even allow any of the people being controlled to enter the Underworld and fight to their deaths.

He was indeed a kind-hearted man who had taken a wrong turn.

“Forget it!” Hongyu sighed. He was becoming more and more transparent. Specks of light was beginning to fly out from his soul. “Life was always meant to be this way. The living beings in the Three Realms are fated not to be able to escape from the pains of Samsara. They can only fight to survive in the mortal world. No matter how hard I try, I cannot fight the heavens.”

“Why do you refer to it as the pains of Samsara?” Shen Ying suddenly asked.

Hongyu paused and looked at her. “If Samsara was not painful, why do mortals pursue immortality? My life wish was to help the living beings of the Three Realms escape this Samsara.”

“But how is your life wish related to the Three Realms?”

“What?” Hongyu stared blankly at her.

“I mean, Uncle… did you conduct research on the population? There are many people who pursue immortality, but there are more people in the world who are mere mortals.”

“But who doesn’t want to live forever?”

“Oh, have you asked the living beings of the Three Realms?”

“Well…” He trailed off.

“You didn’t even ask them before deciding that all of them want eternal life?” Shen Ying sighed and sat down, cross-legged. She rested her chin on her knuckles and said, “Perhaps eternal life is good, but you could be the only one who thinks that way. Each person has a different opinion. For all we know, some people don’t even want to live.”

“I…” Hongyu turned pale. He did not know what to say in response.

“You made the decision for them without even asking. Even when we elect the president, everybody has a say. Whether they want to live or they want to die, this is a matter for them to decide. You cannot take away everybody’s power to choose, then say it’s for their own good, right?”

“…”

“Uncle, you can’t have such double standards as a god.”